…is never a pleasure. It happens not too often but when it does, you’ll feel overwhelmed by the odds of encountering some misfortune. This is the day when the world seems to be on a collision course, resulting in spilt coffee on your iron-pressed white shirt and missing socks just as you’re late for work. Things don’t get any better and I bet you know the drill.
The beginning of April saw me dealing with a series of unfortunate accidents. I’m not talking about one bad day. I’m talking about a whole week of hard luck. I'd wake up and get out of the wrong side of the bed every single day in broken record fashion. It was a Groundhog Day nightmare for seven days straight.
It all began when N went for a business trip overseas. I continued with my routine of driving to work and coming back home in the evening. The day went fine until I got stuck with a faulty engine while the traffic was at peak in the university area where I work. The car rumbled before it went motionless. Because of the heavy rain, I was left with no choice but to leave my car on campus grounds and wait for the traffic to lessen. The wait stretched up to a couple of hours.
When I returned home close to midnight, the only thing on my mind was a long hot bath to help me make peace with all the blows. Just as I entered the tub, I found something that Charlie left for me to clean up after. I looked at him. He stared back. If the cat could talk, he would’ve said something along the lines of, “Don't look at me! Shit happens!” Instead of having a bubble bath, I ended up scrubbing the tub before bedtime.
The following day didn’t get any better. Nor the day after or the one after that. There’s no need for me to mention every single one of them. For some reason, bad days seem to trigger a domino effect of things unpleasant. I was overwhelmed by the episodes of misfortune that I became emotional. Even when I got my car back, and things seemed to get better soon after, I still couldn’t shake off the blues that I was feeling. Worst of all, I lost my sleep.
I’d never mention sadness here because I rarely feel it nowadays and this blog is mostly a list of positives. Things have been exceptionally good after the battle I had gone through the first half of last year. I'd say joy only comes after your triumph over a particular sadness. We have our own apartment, we make considerably good income out of our freelance projects, my teaching career is still on track and I have a lot to look forward to our plans for near future. So to have my spirit down in the dumps, for reasons that I couldn’t identify, made me even more uneasy. Could it be depression? Some sort of anxiety? Or was I merely complaining?
Then one late evening, as I was driving home from work, I passed by a factory on the highway. I saw a group of young female workers smiling and laughing with one another as they were marching home. Later I passed by the construction workers. They were all getting ready to start their night shift at the grounds of an unfinished railway transit. They looked eager to carry out their responsibilities. I realized how easy it is for us with 'cushy' lives to come up with a laundry list of grievances. We forget that the entire universe exists in its great entirety that our problems are actually trivial and microscopic in comparison. The only thing we need is perspective. I needed that, it seems.
All things considered, my life is worth being grateful for. Within that same (awful) week, I began recognizing all the good people in my life. My childhood friend came all the way from next town to cheer me up with her swift wisecracks. A group of my gal pals took me out for fine dining so that we could share our ups and downs in between appetizer and dessert. My favorite guy friends stayed up with me for late night coffee, cracking inside jokes and all until the wee hours of morning. Getting to hug my mom and grandma also gave me a peace of my mind.
And of course, having N returned home safely made me feel nothing more than glad. I’d also gotten a kind note from a student who helped me get back home from work during my car-less days; a note that says how much I inspired her to do the best in life. These people had reached out with words of comfort and support to me during adverse times. Finally, I felt relieved. Breathable. Better. You can’t be a standalone island, after all. Everybody needs this support system to make those bad days bearable.
